Amazon Changed Holiday Shopping Forever — Now App Showdown Is On

Google Maps’ indoor guides to the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota (left)and Macy’s in New York City. Image: Google

In late 2010, Amazon delivered a big lump of coal to its offline competitors in the form of its Price Check app. Smartphones had already started to change the e-commerce equation by enabling shoppers to bring the means of buying online straight into a traditional store. But Price Check burned away the awkwardness of tapping out the names of individual items into tiny search boxes by building a barcode scanner into the app. With one tap, the (often lower) Amazon price for the item in front of you materialized. A few more taps, and that item was on the way to your house, to which you returned without buying a thing from the store. Showrooming became a no-brainer.

That year, Price Check was only on iPhone in time for Black Friday. Then last year, it came to Android — the most popular smartphone operating system — and Black Friday mobile sales spiraled upward. This year will likely see the trend continue now that even brick and mortar retailers reluctantly acknowledge showrooming has become a standard practice thanks to the smartphone.

“People are basically using it as a price-transparency device,” says Scot Wingo, CEO of e-commerce software maker ChannelAdvisor.

But showrooming isn’t the only thing going on. Smartphones have tunneled their way into nearly every dimension of daily life, a reality some of the biggest forces in retail seem to be confronting head-on this holiday season. Whether online or off, companies are recognizing that people will use their phones to shop. In the run-up to this Black Friday, many of the biggest names in shopping have rolled out new apps or updates that acknowledge the new reality of anytime, anywhere retail — a reality in which getting someone to tap an app on Black Friday is at least as important as getting them through the door.

Above: Google

For Google Maps, the final frontier isn’t space or the South Pole, but the great indoors. The company that has mapped most of the known world visible from streets and roads has started moving inside, including here at WIRED. But most of Google’s new initiatives have a business as well as a gee-whiz angle, and indoor maps are no exception. For the holidays, Google is promoting its indoor floor plans of major retailers as the secret to a friction-free Black Friday. Layouts of shopping destinations like the Mall of America in Minnesota and Macy’s in New York are included in Google Maps for Android; Google promises the app will guide you through the retail chaos via the familiar pulsing blue dot to locate you in the store.

Walmart

Starting this week, Walmart says its mobile app will include maps of individual stores that highlight the locations of big Black Friday markdowns. (This year’s marquee deal: A $399 iPad that comes with a $75 Walmart gift card.) Walmart has probably pursued the meshing of mobile with offline shopping more aggressively than any other traditional retailer, and for good reason. Last year, Amazon’s sales were more than five times those of Walmart online, no doubt some of them generated via Amazon Price Check in a Walmart store. Walmart’s app now has a barcode scanner of its own that lets you keep a running total of what’s in your physical shopping cart. You can also flip through a virtual version of the Black Friday circular for your local store. When you go into the store, the location-aware app switches over to in-store mode automatically and points you to what’s on sale.

Target

This year, Target’s app aims to solve a particularly sticky problem for parents: how to shop for your kids while you have them in tow. Instead of parking them in front of the wall of TVs while you race to the toy aisle, you can scan QR codes next to the 20 most popular toys, pay on your phone, and have them shipped for free.

Target also says through December 16 it will match the prices of Amazon.com, Walmart.com, BestBuy.com, and Toysrus.com, among others — one way to turn Price Check against Amazon. At the same time, another perk could backfire on Target itself: The retailer is offering free WiFi at all its stores to make ordering from Target.com easier, which, of course, makes ordering online from anyone else easier too.

American Express

You can’t use your phone as your American Express card yet. But the credit card company clearly wants you to get used to pulling out your phone at the checkout counter, and to think of AmEx when you do it. Using its new app, AmEx members can redeem reward points for instant gift cards they can use right in the store. Retailers on board for the launch include Banana Republic, Gap, Old Navy, PBteen, Pottery Barn, Pottery Barn Kids, West Elm, and Williams-Sonoma. Like most mobile gift cards, the AmEx cards work by scanning an on-screen barcode at the register. While the small number of retailers might make the app’s appeal seem limited, AmEx wants its brand “front of mind” when shoppers think mobile. According to an AmEx survey, about one-third of U.S. shoppers intend to use their mobile devices for holiday shopping this year — up from one-quarter a year ago.

Amazon

As we suggested earlier, Amazon’s Price Check app will likely get a heavy workout again this Black Friday as shoppers look to see if Amazon has slashed prices even further than the store you’re in. Combined with Amazon Prime and 1-Click Ordering, other retailers cower at Amazon’s ability to have nearly anything zipping quickly and cheaply to customers after just a few swipes on the touchscreen. But Amazon isn’t the only seller that benefits from its efficiencies. Third-party sellers do a substantial chunk of business via Amazon, and Amazon has stepped in to help that service grow even more by giving those sellers access to Amazon’s advanced logistics and shipping services. Amazon is also positioning limited time, limited quantity “lightning deals” front-and-center in its app this week.

eBay

Mobile is a central part of eBay’s strategy to cinch its brand overhaul from auction site to a “buy anything anywhere with any device” platform. The company says it’s seen a huge rise in sales via its mobile app. With its acquisition of RedLaser two years ago, eBay has also become the other showrooming app retailers rue. Unlike Amazon, however, eBay’s primary business consists of connecting third-party sellers with shoppers. Opening eBay’s app the Monday before Black Friday, for example, the most prominent link takes you to Toys”R”Us on eBay. This holiday season will also be the first when the company’s eBay Now same-day delivery service will be available, albeit only in San Francisco and parts of New York City. EBay says its ramping up the number of couriers it will have ready on Black Friday to ferry items from stores like Macy’s and Best Buy to shoppers who would rather stay home.

PayPal

For PayPal, the Black Friday challenge is how to get people used to paying with PayPal online to start thinking of it as a way to pay offline, too. Only a few national chains are set up to accept PayPal at the checkout counter, among them Home Depot, Abercrombie & Fitch, and Jamba Juice. Unlike the other apps featured here, you don’t need to have your phone with you at all to pay with PayPal at the register — just your phone number and a PIN, which are tied to your PayPal account, or a PayPal card. (PayPal is also just starting to roll out a smartphone-based payment option, as seen to the right.) During the holiday season, PayPal also is offering price matching: PayPal will refund the difference to your account if you buy something with PayPal and then find it for a lower price somewhere else.

Flipboard

Though not a retail force, Flipboard’s holiday gift guide is worth mentioning as an elegant, relaxing alternative to shivering in a parking lot with strangers at 4 a.m. As part of its curated content offerings, Flipboard has divided its guide into predictable sections — kids, gadget lovers, foodies, etc. What makes the sections stand out, however, is the unpredictability within each, fueled by the RSS and social network feeds funneled into Flipboard’s magazine-style layout. Levi’s has a sponsored section in the guide, while sections for Apple’s iBookstore Gilt Taste look like actual catalogs, complete with “buy” buttons — perhaps a new business model for the New Year?